Package: debian-policy Priority: wishlist Hi all,
It was suggested to me (#349170) that we should use a virtual package
'cron-service' to make it easier to people to switch between different cron
implementations. Currently in Debian there are three of them available:
vixie-cron, which is our current standard, fcron and bcron (Bruce's cron).
Many packages that currently depend on 'cron' depend on 'cron | bcron', if a
new cron replacement (such as mcron, xcron, chronic or upstart) gets into
Debian all those packages need to be modified to Depend on: 'cron | bcron |
fcron | mcron | upstart | chronic', making transitions a pain and forcing
admins to play with the package system to satisfy dependancies.
Now, we *used* to have a 'cron-daemon' virtual package but it was removed
from Debian policy (in version 3.6.2.2) since the previous cron maintainer
wanted policy to clarify what it should 'mean' (see #257726)
I propose re-adding 'cron-daemon' with the following requirements (that will
need to be written down similarly to the 11.6. section "Mail transport,
delivery and user agents"):
[ POSIX ]
- Has to provide /usr/bin/crontab and support crontab entries
[ Implemented in most Linux / BSD distributions, including Debian, but not
in Solaris, HP-UX or AIX's cron ]
- Correct execution of /etc/cron.d
- Correct support of /etc/crontab
- Correct support of /etc/cron.{allow,deny}
- Has to support 'crontab -u'
- Support of crontab entries with extended features (i.e. those in Vixie
Cron need to be supported), these include names for days and months,
ranges, step values and the 'special strings' (@reboot, @yearly..)
[ Debian-specific feature ]
- Correct execution of /etc/cron.{hourly,daily,weekly,monthly}
Does anyone oppose this new virtual package?
Javier
PS: Debian-policy people, please CC: me on replies
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